“How am I doing, Mr. King? Is the picture beginning to form? Well, I'm not through yet, there's still the clincher, there's the photostat of a memo you made dated May First —can you read it, Mr. King? You're damn right you can. It says, 'See Anderson 11 A.M. 5-3 re turnpike deal'. It's a note made in your own hand, on the memo pad that's on your desk right now. Well, King, how does it look? Have I got you or haven't I?”
He looked gutshot and sick, but there was still some fight in him. “You punk,” he said hoarsely, “Do you know who you're talking to! Do you know what the penalty for blackmail is in this state!”
I knew who I was talking to, all right. I took a step forward and pushed him against his desk. “Do I know who I'm talking to?” I said. “Now there's an idiotic question— I know more about you than your own mother could ever guess. I know you for the thieving sonofabitch you really are, King, and that's not just guessing; I've got the proof. Sure, you're a state senator, which bothers me not at all. You're a state senator who has a pretty good chance of becoming Governor someday, if you keep your nose clean, and that's exactly the reason you're going to do as I say, because you want to be Governor, and because you haven't got the guts to do anything else. Oh, I know who I'm talking to, all right. You think I'd be damn fool enough to approach someone with a deal like this unless I knew him?”
I let him go and he almost fell.
“What... what do you want!”
“Money, of course.”
“And what... do I get for it?”
“I am not an unreasonable man, Mr. King. Get in and get out, that's my motto. I'm here to sell you the originals of those photostatic copies you have in your hand—my price is twenty thousand dollars.”
“What!”
“Twenty thousand dollars,” I said. “Think of it, that's not so expensive for complete protection. You'll be buying the original documents, remember that, not the copies. You won't have to worry about my milking you year after year. One price buys everything, a clean bill of health. Anyway, what are you hollering about? You made more than twenty thousand out of that contract deal with Commissioner Anderson.”
His face was gray. “I won't pay it!”
This was just reflex. His morale had taken a beating and he had to make a show of resistance for his own benefit.
“All right,” I said.
That surprised him.
“What?”
“I said all right, I can't force you to buy something you don't want. All I can do is take the documents to the proper authorities and see that they get the proper publicity. You know, maybe I had you figured wrong, King. I figured your political life was worth at least twenty thousand; I had it figured all along that you would consider it a bargain at that price. Well, I guess I was wrong.”
He looked a hundred years old. “... Ten thousand,” he said finally.
I hooked a chair with my foot, pulled it up and sat down. “I have nothing important to do,” I said. “I can wait. If you want to play it cute, it's all right with me.”
He put his hands to his face and for one horrible moment I was afraid he was going to cry. But he got hold of himself. He wiped his forehead with a crisp white linen handkerchief, then tucked the handkerchief back into his chest pocket, very neatly.
It didn't take long. “... All right. Twenty thousand. Now where are the originals.”
This was more like it. “I told you I didn't have them on me. But I'll have them this afternoon, say one o'clock.”
He nodded heavily.
“At the Central Bus Station,” I said. “I'll have the papers and you have the money, in small bills, nothing over a twenty. One o'clock will give you plenty of time to arrange it at the bank.”
I stood up, smiled. “Mr. King, it's been a great pleasure to do business with a man of your intelligence.”
The girl in the second office, the secretary, smiled as I came out of King's office. “It's a beautiful day, isn't it, sir?” she said.
“It sure is that! It's a beautiful day!”
But it was only the beginning. Let's see now, I thought, floating down the corridor toward the elevators. Let's see, King buys one bill of goods for twenty thousand, and there must be at least enough material in his files for four more sales. Four times twenty thousand... five times twenty thousand, counting the present deal, came to an even hundred thousand. One hundred thousand beautiful dollars, that's what Parker King was worth to me if I handled it right! If I didn't push him too hard or too fast. One hundred thousand dollars!
Still, that was only the beginning!
In John Venci's strongbox there were at least fifteen names that should be worth plenty. Conservatively, there were at least ten names that should be worth as much as King. But let's be super-conservative, let's say they're worth only half as much as King... let's see, that would be five times one hundred thousand dollars, that was what John Venci's strongbox was worth to me!
And this was the land of money that John Venci had passed up for the sake of revenge! With Venci it figured. He'd had all the money he could use; he could afford to be a theorist. A man like that could afford to kick a million bucks in the face if he felt like it, but not me.
Not Roy Surratt.
No sir, there was a time to be practical, and this was it. After I had milked this thing for all it was worth, maybe I too could afford to retire to a private monastery and contemplate the philosophic truths of crime. But not now. By God, I was just beginning to live, and I was going to enjoy it!
CHAPTER TWELVE
AT EXACTLY ONE o'clock Parker King walked into the Central Bus Station. His face was mask-like, his eyes tired and expressionless. He carried a thick leather briefcase and looked more like a European diplomat headed for the United Nations Assembly than a state senator on his way to pay twenty thousand dollars worth of blackmail.
I was at the lunch counter having a sandwich when he came in.
He looked like he needed a sandwich. And plenty of milk and sun and lots of rest. Parker King looked like a man who was very close to a nervous breakdown.
“The papers,” he said huskily. “For God's sake, if anyone should see me here, that alone would be enough to make them suspect something. A bus station!”
I took the papers from my inside coat pocket and gave them to him. Nervously, he glanced at them, then sagged with relief when he saw that everything was there. “There's just one thing,” he said. “I don't want to see you again, ever, understand?”
“I understand.”
He sat the briefcase down and started to go, and I said, “Just a minute, I'll go outside with you and carry the briefcase. You had it in your hand when you came in. We don't want somebody to think you forgot your briefcase and I was trying to get away with it, do you?”
“I... hadn't thought of that.”
“You should set aside an hour every day,” I said, “just for thinking. You'd be surprised how much trouble you can avoid through a little thinking. Well, I'm ready.”
I picked up the briefcase and we went out together, as though we were buddies, or anyway business acquaintances. When we got to the sidewalk I said, “I don't suppose I need to ask what's in this briefcase.”